Organic Tube Feed?

[Guest guest]

I found this on the internet.. Seems like juicing or blending soft

fruits and veggies might be an option as " tube food " - and perhaps

your best bet for organic.

 

Hope this helps...

Misty L. Trepke

http://health.

 

http://www.sandhoff.org/feeding.html

 

When the time comes that a feeding tube has to be placed, there are

2 general options.

 

1. A " G Tube "

This is placed into the stomach surgically, with a " button " type

opening. This is

more of a permanent option. Feeding will be fed by machine directly

into the

stomach. The healthier the child is the better before getting this

surgery done.

Generally the hospital stay is 2-3 days.

 

2. The " NG tube " this is a soft spaghetti looking small tube that is

placed down

the nose and into the stomach. No surgery is required for placement

of this

tube. A hospice nurse placed ours. The tube is changed once a month,

and you

can do it yourself at home. They say not to use this for more then 6

months

however we had this for over a year and did wonderful with it.

Feeding are done

again by machine through tubing that hooks to the Ng tube.

 

One thing that I have found so frustrating is that most Dr's say

that once a

tube is placed - your only option of food is Pediasure. This is

absolutely Not

True. First of all let me say that in my opinion Pediasure is not a

good source of

nutrition nor does it replace the meals that the child was having

before the

tube was placed. Pediasure is full of sugar, sugar turns into fat -

not good!!!!

There are vitamins in Pediasure but a multiple vitamin supplement is

much

better. I was told when I got the Ng tube / well he should have 3-5

cans a

day! I said and what else, he said Nothing else, he will only have

that from now

on, I said No Way!!!! My child is not living off that!!!! I then had

to become

very creative!!! Me and the blender became the best of friends!!!

 

I based the daily feeding on 1000 calories a day. I used a product

called

Polycose (available at any pharmacy over the counter) which is a

calorie

additive, if the daily amount of calories was not sufficient. Also

you should drop

down to stage 1 or 2 for the baby food.

For breakfast heres an example of what we used

8 ounces soy milk / a jar of bananas / and some rice cereal (3 tblsp)

 

For Lunch: 8-10 ounces of juice or nectar / jar of veggies and

fruit / and

Polycose. The polycose has 200 calories per 1/2 cup of powder.

 

For Dinner: 8-10 ounces of soy milk / 2 jars baby meat.

 

Any of these things can be changed around, put your thinking cap on

and get

truly creative.

 

All if these things should go into the blender and be blended for

quite awhile.

Be careful not to use any foods that contain seeds or chunks, or

even strings,

ie no berry foods, nothing that contain anything that would clog the

feeding

tube. You will have a big problem then!!! Trust me did it quite a

few times

myself. Use things that are smooth, bananas, peaches, pears, plums,

prunes,

etc. Veggies that are good are sweet potatoes, squash, or stage 1

green

beans.

Once you have blended the food / please make sure u strain it

atleast twice!!!

Then you add it to the feeding bag and feed through the machine.

 

When things progress even further into the disease / feedings may

have to be

slowed down, use your judgement in what is best for your child. I

never had to

come to the point that we had to slow feedings, but from listening

to others

one thing that was common was to use pedialite for hydration and

slow the

feedings way down. Most children come to a point in the last stages

in the

disease that they can no longer tolerate any feedings, they will no

longer be

able to digest anything and will vomit the feeding back up. This is

a normal

process of the bodies way to tell you that it is preparing to shut

down.

Hydration only should be used at this point. Feedings to be given at

an

extremely slow rate of 15-30 cc an hour or less. Which is 1/2 to one

ounce of

liquid and hour.

 

Please know that I am available at anytime to answer questions or

concerns

you may have about feedings or nutrition - or anything else you may

want to

know / or need help with.

 

, gominger wrote:

>

> Hi,

> My daughter was in an accident & now needs to be fed through a g-

tube (tube placed directly into her stomach.) I know many cancer

patients often need these for various reasons, too. Anyway, I was

wondering if anyone knew of any companies that sell organic tube

food as the vast majority is junk. I do know Novartis has a brand

called Compleat & that is real food (God only knows what other feeds

are), but I highly doubt it is high quality food. I will pass your

answer along to other groups because there are so many parents that

are like me & want to know.

> Thanks.

> www.hugsfoundation.org

>